Electronic devices on wireless or wired networks exchange messages in packets containing control information, instructions, and data payloads. Some packets are structured to be delivered to specific destinations while other packets may be associated with less reliable broadcast or multicast services. Encapsulation permits logically separate functions in a network to be abstracted from their underlying structures by inclusion of information concealed within higher level objects. The more abstract layers are often called the upper layer protocols and provide application and presentation services while the layers more specific to hardware and message exchange may be called lower layer protocols. The transmission control protocol/internet protocol (TCP/IP) suite, for example, uses encapsulation to provide abstraction of protocols and services at several levels, with the lower or link level containing hardware addressing and frame information, the internet and transport levels providing session and connection services, and the application level containing data payload.